History of the Jews, Vol. 3 (of 6)Graetz, Heinrich
History
History of the Jews, Vol. 3 (of 6)
Graetz, Heinrich
Jews -- History
Judaism cannot, according to this system, be assailed by philosophy
at all, because it stands on a firm basis, which the thinker must
respect, the basis of historical facts. The Jewish religion entered the
world not gradually, little by little, but suddenly, like something
newly created. It was revealed to a vast multitude--to millions of
men--who had sufficient means of inquiring and investigating whether
they were deceived by some trickery. Moreover, all the miracles that
preceded the revelation on Sinai, and continued to occur during the
wandering in the desert, took place in the presence of many people. Not
only on one occasion, the beginning of Israel's nationality, was the
evident interference of God manifested, but it revealed itself often,
in the course of five hundred years, in the outpouring of the spirit
of prophecy upon certain individuals and classes. By virtue of this
character, of the confirmed authenticity of these facts, Judaism is
invested with a certainty greater than that established by philosophy.
The existence of God is demonstrated more powerfully by the revelation
of Sinai than by the conclusions of the intellect. Jehuda Halevi
believed that he had not only cut away the ground from beneath the
philosophical views of his time, but that he had also undermined the
foundations both of Christianity and Islam, and laid down the criterion
by which the true could be distinguished from the false religion.
Judaism does not feed its adherents with the hope of a future world
full of bliss, but grants them here on earth a glimpse of the heavenly
kingdom, and raises, through an enduring chain of indisputable facts,
the hope of the immortality of the soul to the plane of absolute
certainty.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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